“I take it that you mean the bottle, in this here palaver, Hookey,” broke in Mr Dawkins, still staring upon the Jew. “Is that it?”
“The bottle, to be sure, Mr Dawkins. According to what you said, you know,” returned Gamaliel, “or I wouldn’t have taken the liberty.”
“Ay, ay,” said Dawkins. “According to what I said. Which was,” says he, turning to Pomfrett, “that I hadn’t no objections to one or two respectable merchants of this here city seeing the thing, but I wouldn’t make it generally public—not generally—for reasons good. But you shall see for yourselves, gentlemen, and give me your opinion, if you’ll be so good.—Fetch aft the bottle, Hookey.”
Gamaliel lit a lamp, and for the first time we saw plainly what manner of man was our mariner. His little eyes gleamed under a penthouse brow, tufted with grey hair, from a broad face tanned mahogany-colour, his mouth very wide, shutting with a square jaw. He was dressed in a fine blue coat with brass buttons and a brocaded waistcoat. But, the buttons were tarnished, the clothes were soiled, and fitted him ill, folding in deep creases upon his massive figure, as though they had been made for another man. His great hands, tattooed and knotted and scarred, loosely clasped together upon the table before him, would alone have marked him for a sailor. But, what kind of a sailor? Mariners were plentiful in Bristol; we should know the marks of them by heart; but this gentleman had something in addition—some latent, yet unmistakable quality which we could not name. It was not only the strong impression he disengaged that Mr Dawkins, mariner, would be a dangerous man to anger; there was more than that. As his little eyes, deep-set in the shadow, caught a sparkle of the lamplight and gleamed at us, and his wide mouth curved in a smile, wrinkling his brown chin, we knew very well that there lurked a whole secret history, and a kind of menace, behind that crafty, good-humoured visage. Yet we were not daunted; rather, we were attracted by Mr Dawkins.
“You see,” said Gamaliel, going to a corner cupboard, “I am what I may term a confidential agent in such little matters; this same curiosity being of some value, why, Mr Dawkins gives it to me to take care of when ashore. The beach is a more dangerous place to seamen, Mr Pomfrett, if you’ll believe me, than——”
“Here, stow that, Hookey,” interrupted Mr Dawkins. “Your tongue’s too long by half, my lad. Let’s see the booty.”
Gamaliel placed on the table a round-bellied Dutch flask, the mouth tied over with canvas. Inside was a brown and crumpled scrap of paper. Mr Dawkins cut the string with a clasp-knife, which he stuck beside him in the board, shook out the paper, spread it flat on the table, and bent over it with an eager attention.
“Well, now,” remarked Gamaliel, “a person might think as you’d never seen that curiosity afore, to look at you, and you bringing it thousands of leagues across the sea in your own chest.”
Dawkins, unheeding, continued to study the paper. “That’s it, sure enough,” said he, presently. “Here you are, sirs—a ven’rable relic of good old days.” He pushed the paper across the table. This is what we read:
“Capt. Grammont to Capt. de Graaf.